Celebrities Who’ve Turned Their Divorces into Art

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In her September interview with Hillary Clinton for her show The 411, Mary J. Blige mentioned her recent divorce from her husband and manager, Kendu Isaacs. “Right now, my strength is being tested because I’m going through this horrible divorce,” she told Clinton, shortly before launching into a version of Bruce Springsteen’s “American Skin.”
Not long after, the singer debuted a different tune of her own called “Thick of It” at a Connecticut concert. “It’s hard to tell who’s wrong or right,” she sang. “When it’s dark, I swear I barely see the light.” With this move, Blige joined the storied group of celebrities who have created art inspired not just by heartbreak, but divorce.

Nora Ephron

The late writer’s first novel, Heartburn, published in 1983, was the exact application of her own advice (recounted in the HBO biographical documentary Everything Is Copy) to “become the heroine rather than the victim of the joke.” In Heartburn, which was later adapted into a film starring Jack Nicholson and Meryl Streep, Ephron wrote about the funniest, saddest, and most jarring parts of her divorce from renowned Watergate journalist Carl Bernstein. In the documentary, late director Mike Nichols summarized Ephron’s healing process: “She . . . cried for six months and wrote it funny. In writing it funny, she won.”

By John Shearer/WireImage/Getty Images.

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Katy Perry

Katy Perry and Russell Brand announced their split in 2012, just 14 months after they were married. Perry was quite open about the breakup, especially when she told Vogue that she found out about their divorce via text message. Shortly after the split, Perry premiered “Wide Awake,” the first song that appeared to directly address her divorce. The singer addressed the end of her marriage more explicitly in a ballad called “By the Grace of God” on her 2013 album, Prism. “Imagine what happens when you go through a breakup,” she told E.W. at the time. “We all go through breakups and we all get very depressed and desperate. The lyrics are very exact and autobiographical.”

From A.P. Images.

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Chris Martin

Just before the Coldplay singer and his ex-wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, announced their “conscious uncoupling” in April 2014, Martin released a song, “Magic," that, as People notes, seemed to perfectly reflect the pain of his troubles with Paltrow. “Call it magic, cut me in two, and with all your magic, I disappear from view,” he sang. The singer later told Harper’s Bazaar U.K. that he sometimes thinks it might have been better if he and his ex had stayed married. “But we have been able to solidify this friendship, so that we’re really close,” he said. “We’ve made a lot of mistakes, and we’ve had good days and bad days, but I have to say, I’m proud of us for working through so much stuff together, and not blaming and shaming.”

By Ralph Crane/The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images.

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Toni Braxton

The R&B singer and Mint Condition keyboardist, Keri Lewis, announced they were separating in 2009; they officially divorced in 2013 (the split was described as amicable). In February 2014, Braxton released an album called Love, Marriage & Divorce, a collaborative effort with artist Babyface that won a Grammy in 2015. Both artists had, by that point, gone through public divorces, which inspired their award-winning creation. “It was a dark period. But [Babyface] was the person who snapped me out of it,” Braxton told the Los Angeles Times. “He said, ‘Toni, you’re forgetting you’re an artist. Stop being a business manager and tell people your story.’”

From NBC/Getty Images.

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Blake Shelton

Blake Shelton and Miranda Lambert’s divorce inspired Shelton to write his own song about the breakup, “Came Here to Forget,” which appeared on his 2016 album,If I’m Honest. “I don’t think I’ve ever had a song that’s such a direct look into my life,” he told The Washington Post in March 2016.

From A.F. Archive/Alamy.

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Nancy Meyers

There must just be something about Jack Nicholson that inspires writers to cast him in romantic comedies based on their divorces. In 2003, screenwriter Nancy Meyers’s film Something’s Gotta Give, featuring a divorced playwright (portrayed by Diane Keaton) who falls in love with a known player on the N.Y.C. dating scene (Nicholson), was inspired by parts of her own split in 1999 from her creative partner, director, and producer Charles Shyer,The New York Times reported. She kept the divorce-recovery-via-art theme going when she later wrote on the topic—featuring recognizable parallels to her own family experience—in 2009’s romantic comedy It’s Complicated, starring Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, and Steve Martin. But Meyers and Shyer reportedly have a solid working relationship, even to this day. “We have a shorthand,” Shyer said in the Times piece. “If you work together for that long, there are no preambles. You don’t have to explain stuff. We just had the same emotional sensibility.”

By Steve Azzara/Corbis/Getty Images.

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Nick Lachey

It’s been more than a decade since Jessica Simpson and Nick Lacheyfiled for divorce, but Lachey documented their split in his 2006 single, “What’s Left of Me.” “It’s not in any way vindictive or an assault on her,” he told People of his decision to write the song. “Jessica knows I still love her,” he continued. But both parties have moved on since then—Simpson married husband Eric Johnson in 2014, and Lachey has been married to his wife, Vanessa, since 2011. The Simpson-Lachey relationship, though long finished, still inspires nostalgia for fans of MTV’s Newlyweds.

By Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images.

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Brad Pitt

In May 2017, Brad Pittspoke with GQ about his life after splitting from Angelina Jolie. The father of six explained to the magazine that life is a lot quieter around his home these days, save for his dog, Jacques. He’s used his free time to take up sculpting, working in the studio of his friend, contemporary artist Thomas Houseago. “If I’m not creating something, doing something, putting it out there, then I’ll just be creating scenarios of fiery demise in my mind,” Pitt told the magazine. “I’m working with clay, plaster, rebar, wood. Just trying to learn the materials . . . I find vernacular in what you can make, rather than giving a speech. I find voice there, that I need.”